Luanda, ANGOLA, July 19 - The National Assembly (AN) on Thursday unanimously approved the application of Value Added Tax (VAT) in Angola, as of October 1, with the education and health sectors exempted from tax. ,

The Proposed Law amending the VAT Code was approved with 110 votes in favor (MPLA), 31 against (UNITA) and 14 abstentions (CASA-CE, FNLA and PRS), in an ordinary plenary meeting, chaired by the Speaker of the National Assembly, Fernando da Piedade Dias dos Santos.

The change in the law aims to bring the legislative package into line with the process of preparing companies to pay VAT, since many of them were not subject to the general scheme and were not part of the large taxpayers and were not prepared to liquidate it from 1 July (originally proposed).

The changes made include the tax rate for the transitional regime from seven to three percent, as well as updating the registration from 60 to 30 days from the date of publication of the Law.

Also exempt from VAT are hospital equipment, transport of patients and goods for the treatment of natural disasters.

The tax regime for VAT was also adjusted for the province of Cabinda, taking into account the territorial discontinuity, in order to maintain the same incentives for local import and production.